Right to die activism is structured around the demand and desire to time one’s own death under the belief that the ability to control the dying process eases and improves it for both the individuals demanding this right as well as for their affective networks. In such a way, this issue is often framed around logics of individual choice and personal autonomy. While opponents in ongoing debates over medically assisted dying will thus accuse activists of embracing an unbridled neoliberal individualistic ethics that devalue life and the ageing process and reject notions of community and care, this talk aims to complicate this point of view by showing how this process of temporally structuring death can counter-intuitively become an ethics for life.

This workshop will not have a pre-circulated paper. If you have any questions or require assistance to attend, email the MaIOW coordinator: Kieran Kelley (kierankelley@uchicago.edu).